Christmas 1 A - Dec 29, 2013

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY

Br. Bernard Jean Delcourt, OHC

Christmas 1 A – Sunday 29 December 2013

Isaiah 61:10-62:3
Galatians 3:23-25;4:4-7
John 1:1-18

“In the beginning was the Word” says John,
and “without him not one thing came into being.”

In sweeping poetry, the disciple whom Jesus loved tells us what we need to know to approach and know God.  If we believe in Jesus, God saves us by adopting us as God’s very children.

We cannot know God directly, but Jesus knows God.  Jesus is the fullness of God. And we can know Jesus if we choose to believe in him.  And in knowing Jesus, we know God.

*****

John’s gospel does not start with a Nativity of Jesus but instead it puts Jesus squarely at the Nativity of the known universe.  “In the beginning was the Word” says John, and “without him not one thing came into being.”

We are left in no doubt that before there was anything, there was the Word. And some of those things that were not before the Word are time, space and matter.  

Try imagining existence without time, space and matter. We have a hard time imagining existence without those realities.  And indeed, the very fact of “being” did not exist before the Word.  The state of Being itself is part of Creation.

*****

In his prologue, John powerfully introduces us to a God who is intimately involved with matter as its Creator, and yet is essentially beyond matter and any of its prerequisites, such as time and space.

And John also lets us glimpse that God is a community of relationship; the Word was not separate from God, was indeed God, and yet was also with God.

*****

This foreword to the Gospel according to John is a masterpiece of simple but powerful poetry.  And yet in its simplicity and power, this poetry conveys all the fundamentals of theology.

Before all else there is God and from the beginning, God is loving relationship. For starters, within God’s own nature, God is relationship and love.  The Creator and the Word are one, and yet, at the same time, they also are with one another, without stopping to be one.

If it feels like a mind twister it’s because our minds are of this Creation and not from beyond Creation. Our minds are a grace from God and not on a par with the nature and existence of God.

*****

And the God that John introduces us to in the prologue chooses to simplify everything, chooses to simplify our entering in relationship with him by choosing to enter into Creation on the same footing as his very Creatures.  The maker of all matter, chooses flesh, a very special matter, to reveal himself to his Creation.

“He was in the world” and “He came to what was his own” and “to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.”

Suddenly, adoption by God becomes possible by receiving the Word, by believing in his name, which in Hebrew literally means “God saves” (Yehoshua, Yeshua, Jesus).

Suddenly we no longer need to understand God as God beyond ourselves.  But we are invited to relate to God as amongst ourselves, as one of us, Emmanuel. We are told “No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known.” But God has now been made known to us as our Father and we can cry “Abba, Father” at the prompting of the Spirit of Jesus our Brother, sent by God in our very hearts now and forever.

*****

The flesh of Jesus is powerfully manifest to us here today through the sacrament of the Eucharist. This is one way in which we can today meet God that Saves in the flesh.

Another way is that the spirit of Jesus, the Word, is present through the Holy Spirit of God awakening us to his words in our existence.  The Word, the Wisdom, the Holy Spirit of God can touch us anytime, whether through the words of holy scripture, or the words of God’s creation writ large all around us.

Any human flesh, any human face, any created thing has the power to shine God’s light and life on you. Make sure to notice that more often.

And these means of relationship, the very threads of this existence; time, space, matter, being are all pure gifts by the will of God.  And it is those gifts which enable us to relationship with the Divine by the sheer grace of God.

If God were to will to put an end to time, space or matter, none of our rich relationship with God, within God would be possible anymore.  But if we are learning one thing about God, it’s that God never tires of relationship.  God keeps trying with us.  Thanks be to God.

*****

In the week to come, see if you can sidle up to these 18 verses of the prologue again. Read them aloud a couple of times and see what those words conjure up in you. It is poetry, after all; it deserves to be read aloud and heard to work its charm on our hearts. God is very near to you.

*****

Jesus, you are very near to us.  Beloved Word of God, our Lord, our Redeemer and our God, give us to believe in your Light and your Life through your grace and truth. Amen.

Christmas Eve - Dec 24,2013

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Andrew Colquhoun, OHC
Year A - Christmas Eve - Tuesday, December 24, 2013

Isaiah 9:2-7 
Titus 2:11-14 
Luke 2:1-14(15-20) 

The monastery's St Augustine Church all decked out for Midnight mass.

I’m thinking about all the memories floating about here tonight…and I’m enough of a softy to imagine that most of them are good memories. I’m also enough of a realist to know that some of them are painful and full of aches to some of our hearts. A mixed bag, but all part of the memory and longing that fill each Christmas.

I grew up in Scotland when it was still pretty Calvinist. Christmas was not a holiday for most people…there was a war going on and that made things even more austere. My father always worked.  The Kirk didn’t have services unless Christmas was on a Sunday… popish, you see. We celebrated at home with a good dinner and a clootie dumpling (look it up!) but what we were really looking forward to was New Year – Hogmanay.

I remember well the bleakness of the war years and the lightening up of peacetime. We immigrated to this country on December 21st and I thought America was all light…Christmas trees everywhere, presents wrapped in shiny paper with ribbons (not brown paper packages tied up with strings). Tinsel and bells… and parties with plenty of food.  You people knew how to party.

It took a little while to see beneath the glitter to the ordinary human sorrows. It took some time for me to acknowledge the fear of knowing that underneath I was more different that even my accent showed.  I went to an all white school – class of ’54 and laughed at the boys who wore green on Thursdays with a lump in my throat that somebody would find out.  One of the misfits, one of the lonely ones.

But each year God intruded and  comforted again when the magic, loving time of Christmas came…and I could go alone to Church at midnight and step into the mystery of a love that broke through any darkness the year could have brought, finding comfort in a mothering, fathering God.

So many memories… I’m sure you’re remembering right now, too.  Here in this holy space which is so full of prayer…

But one memory in particular stands out for me. Our first Christmas pageant in South Africa.  Most of the local children had been unchurched when we got there and our Young Adult Service Corps volunteer took it upon herself to organize a pageant.  She worked very hard with those kids.  They had it down pat.  We invited people from the town and the cathedral to see this triumph.  The church was full.

It started off fine -  the narrator set the stage and then Gabriel appeared. She was six feet tall in a bed sheet with a tinsel halo.  Mary was perfect, quiet in blue.  Joseph didn’t know exactly what was going on but then, he never really did anyway!  Gabriel made her announcement -  Mary froze; Gabriel announced again – Mary stayed frozen. And again – frozen.  Finally, Gabriel lost it, swore at Mary, ripped off her halo and threw it at the Virgin. Joseph, God bless him, still didn’t know what was going on.  The shepherds decided to rescue the performance with a dance that made Miley Cyrus look staid.  The director started bawling and the congregation went into hysterical laughter.  Even the mothers were in stitches.

I loved it!  I treasure the memory.  Afterwards, we all had a cup of tea and recovered our composure.

Since then there have been beautiful Christmases.  Since then, we’ve built more memories sharing them together here.  But I go back often to that vivid memory of a bunch of young people who got so lost in and bewildered by a strange story; to the young volunteer who so wanted to do it perfectly and didn’t realize that she had. To the congregation of blacks and whites in rural South Africa who had a raucous good time together all unselfconsciously.

It was perfect because that’s how Jesus always comes.  Not into the sweetness but into the mess of life.  Mary’s there, timid and fearful.  Giving birth away from home and comfort; Joseph holds his little wife clumsily because what does he know?  And like the shepherds of Mariya uMama weThemba we don’t know what to do either and if we have sense we dance and rejoice.  It’s a bittersweet story… of poignancy and tragedy… of refugees trying to get their documents.  People with unknown futures and pasts we often can’t talk about.

We get lost somewhere in the middle of the story…lost with our memories, our sadness, our longing and our loneliness.  And Gabriel pitches her halo at us and says “Glory, Glory – pay attention, people, Glory!”

The world is still a mess.  Children are born under bridges.  Mothers aren’t all lucky enough to have a kindly Joseph.  Fat cats still dominate, wars still destroy the innocent, gun are given as presents.  But the memory of goodness and possibilities and love inexplicable survives and blooms and the promise of this night is that the light will come and a baby’s cry will  break through.  And that cry is the cry of God with us …now , tonight, in this place, in our midst, in our selves.

Advent 4 A - Dec 22, 2013

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Robert James Magliula, OHC
Year A - Advent 4 - Sunday, December 22, 2013

Isaiah 7:10-16
Romans 1:1-7
Matthew 1:18-25

Humanity and Divinity: Joseph and Jesus

  The pressure is growing as we enter the final stretch on this Fourth Sunday of Advent. Both American culture and media have reached a fevered pitch in loading Christmas with false expectations of family harmony and good cheer. Hallmark defines the perfect Christmas, and people spend much time and energy trying to achieve this perfect experience. Among the niceties of the season, we forget just what a scandal the incarnation and birth of Jesus really is. Behind the pretty Hallmark scenes lies wonder alongside of scandal. Today’s Gospel reminds us that God’s work often upsets comfortable social expectations and conventions.

Every third year we hear Matthew tell the story. He writes that Joseph was a “righteous man”. Whatever he believed about Mary, his betrothed, he was not willing to shame her, either by putting her on public trial or trashing her reputation to clear his own. So he resolved to divorce her quietly, without casting blame, choosing the most humane of the customary legal options of his day. He was on the verge of doing so when an angel of the Lord spoke to him---and nothing was ever the same again. Joseph’s sense of right and wrong got lost in the divine shuffle. His righteousness gave way to God’s. He trusted what an angel told him in a dream, and took Mary home as his wife.

Christian tradition has never known quite what to do with Joseph. He disappears from the gospels before Jesus’ baptism and is never heard from again. One legend has it that he was already an old man, a widower with children, when he married Mary. Art, largely commissioned by the Church, supported this image. Paintings portray him as a kindly old man, beyond sexual thought or action, watching the world admire Mary and her child. This neutered version of Joseph certainly tells us more about the Church’s, rather than God’s attitude toward sex. But that’s a different story.

Joseph is usually an extra without lines in the drama starring Mary and the child.  But in Matthew’s Gospel, Joseph is the main character. Gabriel speaks to him, not Mary, as he lies sleeping. “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.” This greeting is important. If the Messiah is to be born the Son of David, then this is the man he must be born to. The prophets said so, and Matthew, writing for a Jewish audience, goes to great lengths throughout his Gospel to persuade us that what the prophets foretold has come to pass in Jesus. So for Matthew it is the annunciation to Joseph, not Mary, which is central. The whole experiment hangs on what happens with Joseph. If Joseph believes the angel, Mary will have a home and her child will be born the Son of David. But if he does not believe, then Mary is an outcast---either disowned or killed by her family for disgracing them and herself by her pregnancy.  

In Jewish law, paternity is not a biological issue but a legal one. Jewish law reads: “If someone says, “This is my son”, he is so attested.” Joseph becomes the child’s father the moment he says so. Joseph’s trust is as critical as Mary’s womb. It will take the two of them to give birth to this remarkable child: Mary to give him life, and Joseph to give him a name. This may all sound very quaint to our modern ears, but the heart of this story is much bigger and more profound---whether from Joseph’s perspective or from Mary’s.

It is about a person who wakes up one day to find their life wrecked: trust betrayed, name ruined, future revoked. It is about a person who surveys a mess not of their own making, and decides to trust that God is present in it. With every reason to disown it all, neither Joseph nor Mary do, they don’t walk away from it in search of a cleaner, more controlled and conventional life. They claim the mess, the scandal and the wonder. Mary gives it her body. Joseph gives it his name. They own the mess---they legitimize it---and the mess becomes the place where the Messiah is born.

Child and Caregiver; Jesus and Joseph

Today Joseph is held up in the story as the one who is most like us, presented day by day with circumstances beyond our control, with lives we would may never have envisioned for ourselves, tempted to divorce ourselves from it all, when an angel whispers to us: “Do not be afraid, God is here. It may not be what you expected or planned, but God may be born here too, if you will permit it.”

That “if” is crucial. God’s “yes” depends on our own. God’s birth requires human partners, a Mary, a Joseph, a you, a me---willing to trust the impossible, willing to claim the scandal and wonder, to adopt it and give it our names. Amidst our less than perfect lives, God is about doing something new and wonderful. And not just in each one of us alone, but the whole Church, surveying a world that seems to have descended into chaos, and proclaiming over and over again to anyone who will listen that God is still with us, that God is still being born in and through the chaos and mess, and among those who will still believe what angels tell them in their dreams.  +Amen.

Advent 1 A - Dec 1, 2013

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. James Michael Dowd, OHC
Year A - Advent 1 - Sunday, December 1, 2013

Isaiah 2:1-5
Romans 13:11-14
Matthew 24:36-44


Swords into Food

A modern plough at work in the field
Kuhn plough at Werktuigendagen 2007

St. Benedict, in his Rule for monks, is famous for telling us that the life of a monk should be a perpetual Lent. I would like to hold out to you the possibility that if Advent had been a fully developed liturgical season at the time that Benedict wrote his Rule, he might have taught us that the life of a monk should be a perpetual Advent.

And here's why: Advent is that season in which we are called to slow down and quiet ourselves in order to awaken ourselves to a new way of life, a new and renewed hope in the God of hope, the God with us. This is, I think, what monastics and those who are inspired by monastic spirituality do. They wait, they watch, they hope. Most of all, they hope.

All of this waiting, watching and hoping is actually quite counter-cultural which, again, a way of being that is, I believe, the mark of a healthy monastic community. Quiet down in December? Yes. Wait, when I've got a million things to do before the holidays? Yes. Believe that in the days to come there will be peace on earth? Yes. Salvation is nearer now more than ever? Yes.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Believing those things is counter-cultural and to be a Christian, in our country at this current moment in history, demands of us, that we be counter-cultural. So here, at the beginning of this blessed season, let us make a commitment to living the life of a perpetual Advent. As St. Paul calls to us from so many years ago, this Advent, let us wake from our sleep; and as Jesus calls to us once awake, we must keep awake. I believe these calls are invitations to waken ourselves to the hope that Isaiah promises in the days to come. And that's what I'd like to talk to you about this morning - that prophesy/hope that Isaiah made in our first reading, one of the most famous of the season of Advent.

In particular, I'd like us to focus on what is perhaps the most well-known verse in the prophesy, verse 4, part of which reads:

...they shall beat their swords into plowshares,and their spears into pruning hooks;nation shall not lift up sword against nation,neither shall they learn war any more.

When I have asked people what they think about this particular verse, I have usually gotten one of three responses. One response is a kind of “that would be nice, but not going to happen in our life times”; another is “yes, but what about the Muslims? Or the Soviets? Or whomever the perceived enemy was at the moment. But the most common response I have heard over the years, and the most dangerous and least hope-filled is the cynical response. The one in which the person says: “Isaiah is a pipe-dream, a naïve and silly approach to world affairs.” This kind of cynicism leads to some realities on the ground that make for an especially un-Advent like approach to our lives.

Because that kind of cynicism is exactly the kind of cynicism that the hope of Isaiah, the hope of Advent, the hope of Christ, should make us reject out of hand. That cynicism is about darkness. And Advent is nothing, if not about light. The light of hope, the light of Christ having come among us, the light of Christ coming again, the light of Christ being right here, right now.

And each week, as we light one more candle on the Advent wreath, slowly, but surely, building the light – it is my prayer, my hope, my expectation, that we will learn what it means to beat swords into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks. That is what it means, I think, to wake up and to stay awake. It is to learn how to accept the invitation from Christ, to be a partner in the building of Christ's light, Christ's reign.

And so what does Isaiah's poetic language mean in real life? Well, to understand that, I think we must start with with text. Isaiah was calling to the people to beat swords into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks not for poetry's sake, but for the sake of food. Plain and simple.
The constant preparation for war was extremely expensive as it is today. Swords and spears were among the most expensive weapons of war at the time and the money that was raised in order to make these weapons came directly from the people and out of their food budgets. The people were starving to death so that enough weapons of war could be made to defend them from being killed by the enemy. This kind of thinking is what passes for being “realistic” and as a “sophisticated” understanding of world politics. It is nonsense.

Isaiah knew that a sword could be reconfigured into a plowshare by a blacksmith. This is actually something that could be done by any ordinary blacksmith. A plowshare is that part of a plow that is sharpened and actually digs the soil in order to create a space where seeds can be sown. Spears could easily be changed by a blacksmith into pruning hooks, which could then be used to prune fruit and nut trees which would provide healthier trees, which would provide more food. Isaiah knew that a hungry people are a desperate people. Feed people, grow peace.
So a less poetic, but perhaps more direct way to relay Isaiah's real meaning might be: “they shall beat their swords and spears into food.” Food that nourishes, food that gives life, food that allows us to continue to build the light. Food for peace. And remember, this wasn't one-sided. Isaiah says that the nations, plural, will be part of this movement.

One other note about the text. The phrase at the beginning of our reading “in the days to come” is not referring to some magical, mystical, time in the future when the Messiah brings all this great stuff about.  Rather “in the days to come” refers to real time, something that will happen in the course of human history, brought about by the peoples of the earth who seek God.

And that got me thinking. And so, to continue my own awakening, I did a little research in the preparation of this sermon. I looked into hunger in our world today. I'd like to do a little visual experiment with you today {count off in sixes, the sixth person raises their hand and keep it in the air}.
Now, please look all around the church. Every person who has their hand in the air represents a hungry person in the United States. One in six persons in the United States, the United States...is hungry.1 They do not have enough food to feed themselves or their families. These people are not only in the poorest neighborhoods in some forgotten inner city, though they are there. They are also in nice neighborhoods in glamorous cities, they are in suburbs, they are in rural areas, they are, perhaps, right in this church. They are us – and we are hungry. They are us, but we are at war. Just last year, in 2012, that meant that 49,000,000 people in the United States, 49,000,000 of our fellow citizens were hungry.

In Afghanistan, the World Food Program says the number of hungry is approximately 7,400,000 people who are classified as starving, and another 8,500,000 people who are classified as facing borderline starvation.3 This is out of a population of 31,000,000 people.
Around the world, in the latest figures we have which date back to 2010, the number of hungry is 870,000,000 people I know these are a lot of numbers, and I'm not really a numbers guy, but I must wake up. We must wake up. Jesus makes it very clear – wake up.

Please be patient with me, just one more set of numbers: Since the war in Afghanistan began in 2001, the United States has spent, as of 5:02 this morning, 677,723,625,603 dollars.5 The website for National Priorities keeps a running ticker as to how many dollars we are spending on this war. It moves so fast, that it is difficult to capture any particular dollar amount, but there it is, as of 5:02 AM – over 677 Billion dollars.
In those same twelve years, we have spent a little more than 24 Billion dollars on food aid for the entire planet. So, 677 Billion dollars for war in Afghanistan alone, and 24 Billion dollars for food all over the world. That is a lot of swords and spears, and not much food.

Now what would it look like if we took a percentage of that money – let's say even just 10% of it – over 67 Billion dollars – and spent some of it on emergency food relief and most of it on teaching people how to grow their own food, how to deal with particular realities like droughts and floods over the long term, and how to build infrastructures to make local agricultural efforts more effective. What would that look like? It would look like we were building the light of the Advent wreath. What if we used 50% - 339 Billion dollars? The light would be shining so brightly we need sunglasses. Peace would be breaking out all over the dinner tables of the world.

Yes, Isaiah, and Paul, and Jesus are all about hope. And so am I – at least on my best days. So here's my hope for myself, my community, and all of you. My hope is that:

In the days to comethe treasury of our countrywill be used to feed our own people;to beat our drones into food for Afghanistan,and our nuclear submarines into food for North Korea.In the days to come,the relative wealth of our monasterywill be used to feed the peopleto turn our treasure into food for Newburgh, Highland, West Park;and to continue to turn our bread into Eucharist for the spiritually hungry.

If you came to the monastery, whether as a guest or as a monk to escape the world, you came to the wrong place. The monastery and monastic spirituality is not an escape from the world, it is a gateway to the world. These beautiful sisters and brothers that God has given to us – sisters and brothers in this church, back home, in Afghanistan, in North Korea, El Salvador and all around the world, are sisters and brothers to be fed and to feed us. They are not to be targets of our swords or spears, our drones or nuclear weapons.
So, in these Advent days to come, I invite you to hope and hope and hope. To watch and to wait by learning what it might mean for you to feed a hungry person, for your community to feed a hungry community, for our nation to feed another nation. In learning those things, we might just not have time to learn war anymore.  Spend these next several weeks being quiet enough to learn what it means to build the light in these days that have come.

AMEN.

Proper 26 C - Nov 3, 2013

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. James Rostron, n/OHC
Year C - Proper 26 - Sunday, November 3, 2013

Isaiah 1:10-18
2 Thessalonians 1:1-4, 11-12
Luke 19:1-10

"Zacchaeus, hurry and come down" - Zacchaeus by Niels Larsen Stevns

“When he saw Jesus, he bowed with his face to the ground and begged him, ‘Lord, if you choose, you can make me clean.’”

“Two blind men followed him, crying aloud, ‘Have mercy on us, Son of David.’”

“They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they begged him to lay his hand on him.”

“As he entered a village, ten lepers approached him.... They called out, saying, ‘Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!’”

“She had heard about Jesus, and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, for she said, ‘If I but touch his clothes, I will be made well.’”

There are many stories in the gospels that begin, like these, with people who come to Jesus seeking healing. And often at the conclusion of these stories Jesus says, “your faith has made you well.” But the story we heard today is different. Zacchaeus is a wealthy, seemingly healthy, individual, who does not seem to be suffering. And he does not ask Jesus for anything; he simply wants to catch a glimpse of Jesus to satisfy his curiosity about what this man looks like who has been causing such a stir. Nevertheless, Zacchaeus is saved, even though Jesus does not refer to the existence of any faith within Zacchaeus.

This unique story is found only in Luke’s gospel, and Luke has positioned it at the end of his travel account, just before Jesus enters Jerusalem. This, and the fact that it is so rich with detail, makes it very worth our while to consider the story carefully. First, we are told that Zacchaeus is a rich tax collector. He is very likely a social outcast because of his collaboration with the Roman Empire, and he would be reviled as a traitor by others in that society. It is remarkable, then, that he chooses to be present at a large, outdoor gathering where he might face the wrath or ridicule of his peers. Second, Zacchaeus climbs a tree. That is probably not something you would see a rich person doing, and it would certainly invite unwanted attention. Yet, he did show up in this great crowd, and he did climb a tree. He even ran through the crowd to get ahead of Jesus in order to do so. All of this together makes it seem clear that Zacchaeus has a strong desire to see Jesus.

Another significant detail in this story is that Zacchaeus is described as being short in stature. This is of course why he needed to climb a tree. But, symbolically, the use of the word “stature” might be telling us about more than just Zacchaeus’s physical height. It may be conveying that he is lacking in his spiritual, rather than just his bodily, growth. Still, Zacchaeus apparently had an inkling that something needed to change in his life, and he took action in climbing that tree. In doing so, Zacchaeus elevated himself above the mass of people on the ground and away from the tyrannical social order of which he was a part. He set himself above his peers and took a step toward heaven and closer to God.

Next comes, to me, the most significant, and moving, event of the story. “When Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said, ... ‘[Zacchaeus,] ... hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today.’” This is an amazing moment. It is the moment when Zacchaeus’s world is changed. He just wanted to see who Jesus was. While he was perhaps responding to an unrecognized and ill-defined impulse toward God, there is no indication that he intended to speak to Jesus or to ask Jesus for anything. Nevertheless, Jesus noticed him and called to him. And with such urgency: hurry, I must stay at your house. Imagine yourself in Zacchaeus’s place. “Are you talking to me!?” The closest “real-life” situation I can think of is to be standing in the front row at a concert, or waiting by the edge of a ball field, or attending a lecture and to have your favorite singer, player, author, or some other famous celebrity call to you to join them for dinner. That would be totally unexpected and pretty darn exciting, a once-in-a-lifetime event. But now, let your imagination go a step further, and put Jesus right in front of you, telling you that he must stay at your house today. That would be truly amazing!

The next detail Luke gives us is that Zacchaeus was quite happy to welcome Jesus to his home, just as you or I would likely be. This adds further support to the notion that Zacchaeus climbed the tree not simply because he was curious but because he felt drawn to Jesus, even if on a subconscious level. In response to Zacchaeus lifting himself above the crowd and toward God, Jesus reached out to Zacchaeus, thereby awakening the goodness that had lain dormant within him. Zacchaeus then stood firm in the face of the crowd’s grumbling about Jesus going to the home of a sinner, and he confirmed his desire to go in the way of Christ. “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.” This is a powerful story of conversion.

One final, important detail is given next, when Jesus says to Zacchaeus, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham.” The phrasing is very universal in nature. Jesus is speaking not to Zacchaeus, but to all those present, and to us. Also, he is speaking not only about Zacchaeus but about his family, as well as the whole nation of Israel. Salvation is available to all who are descended from Abraham. Furthermore, Jesus is stating that salvation was given because Zacchaeus is a member of this nation and not because his faith has made him well. Salvation is a free gift from God. In the final sentence of the story, as Jesus is concluding his journey to Jerusalem, he declares the significance of his encounter with Zacchaeus, which is also the good news of his mission on earth: “For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”

Now, of course, comes the question of how this gospel story is alive for me, and for you. An answer came to me quite unexpectedly during the past week, as I prayed with the passage and began to write down some thoughts. Early last week, I returned from a workshop hosted at a convent in Ohio. It was a wonderful event, the best part of which was the chance to meet other Anglican religious from across North America, including quite a few other novices. At one point during the week, we were offered a tour of the convent. The buildings are much newer than ours, and I found myself coveting the sisters’ clean, neat, well-functioning spaces. Their roof didn’t seem to have any leaks, like ours does, or hopefully now, did. So, I’ve found myself grumbling this week, despite Benedict’s admonishment against it, about all the flaws in our living spaces here. And, this grumbling spilled over to include all the flaws in my brothers. Living in community is indeed a challenge! I’m sure we all grumble from time to time about our various communities at work, home, and church. And there are no doubt plenty of flaws to be found, some of which, shockingly, might even be our own. And our own coworkers, family members, and fellow parishioners might be grumbling about us!

This grumbling became the background noise as I prayed with the story, and just in the past few days it dawned on me that I was in need of a tree to climb. I found a beautiful painting on Wikipedia, by Niels Larsen Stevns, of the scene described in the story. There is Zacchaeus, perched above the commotion on the ground, looking down at Jesus, whose hand is extended upwards toward Zacchaeus. Like me, I imagine Zacchaeus had his share of troubles and gripes, and he most definitely was the object of grumbling amongst his peers. Yet, I see a bubble of peacefulness surrounding him in the midst of chaos. This imperfect man followed an impulse to look toward God, to make himself available to God. God responded, and in turn Zacchaeus responded to God. And from this simple interaction came salvation for Zacchaeus.

Seeing myself in that painting, up in that tree, rising above and letting go of all the grumbling, within and around me, I asked myself, where in my life are those places, real or metaphorical, that will enable me to rise above, to disengage from, the everyday, ordinary troubles and challenges of community life and of the world, where I can make myself fully available to God and to let God know that I desire to live in God’s truth? Where are they for you? Perhaps you or I find it when we go into our room and pray. Or listen to that transforming piece of music. Or lend a hand to our neighbor. Or ponder a work of art. Or watch the sunset. Or go climb a tree. We all are Zacchaeus, whose name means “pure and righteous one.” God loves us. All that is required is that we incline our ear toward God.

Pentecost C - May 19, 2013

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Fr. Bob Pierson, OSB 
Pentecost Year C - Sunday, May 19, 2013

Acts 2:1-21
Romans 8:14-17
John 14:8-17, 25-27

When I was a child, one of my favorite Saturday morning TV shows was a program called, “You Are There.” Each week, actors would reenact an event from American history like the Signing of the Declaration of Independence or the Crossing of the Delaware, and we would be able to watch the event unfold just as if we were part of the scene as it was happening for the first time.

Since then, I have found myself thinking about the events of Scripture in a similar way. What would the coming of the Holy Spirit be like on “You Are There?” I think it could be pretty impressive. With computer graphics being what they are today, one could come up with a very convincing violent wind, and tongues as of fire would not be hard to reproduce at all. We have the speech that Peter gave and we have some idea what first century Jerusalem might have looked like. I think it would be really great, just like it really happened with us right in the scene.

There's one small problem though. We have two accounts of the coming of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles, and the details of each scene vary dramatically. We heard the other account of the coming of the Holy Spirit a few weeks ago on the second Sunday of Easter, when John recounted his version of the story. Instead of the event occurring on Pentecost, 50 days after the Passover, John has the Spirit coming to the apostles on the night of Easter day, just a few hours after the resurrection. It's Jesus' first appearance to his disciples in the Upper Room. No violent wind, no tongues as of fire, no strange languages, just Jesus proclaiming “Peace be with you!” In Luke's account of the event in the Acts of the Apostles, Jesus has already ascended into heaven. In John's account, Jesus is with the apostles, breathing on them and saying, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any they are forgiven them.”

So, which account of the coming of the Holy Spirit do we give to our director for our reenactment? Which is the true account? They both appear in the Bible, and we say that the Bible is without error. Thankfully, we are not Biblical fundamentalists because, both accounts are true, and the differences between them make it difficult to pick one version as the “real” one. Each account has its value, depending on the particular point the author of that account is trying to get across in telling his version of the story.

John wants to connect the coming of the Spirit directly with the resurrection so that's why he places the event on Easter night. Luke puts it on the feast Pentecost, probably to connect the sending of the Spirit with the feast in which the Jewish people celebrate the giving of the 10 Commandments to the people of Israel. John has Jesus “breathe” the Holy Spirit on the disciples alone in the Upper Room, the place where the Last Supper occurred to link the event with the first Eucharist. Luke has the Spirit arrive in a powerful wind, calling to mind the wind that blew over the chaos “in the beginning” at creation and has the event witnessed by “devout Jews from every nation” because he wants us to remember that the gospel is not just for one group of people in one time and place but is the universal Good News for everyone to hear.

The one detail that both accounts of the coming of the Holy Spirit do have in common is that both accounts have the disciples becoming empowered by the Holy Spirit for their mission to the world. And that's the really significant point for us today, because we have also received the Holy Spirit in our baptism, and we too are called to preach the Good News of Christ's death, resurrection, and ascension to the world.

In a very real way, “we ARE there,” witnessing the power of the Holy Spirit in our midst, just as those disciples experienced the Holy Spirit in their lives. The Holy Spirit reminds us again and again that we ARE God's children, right now, and if we are God's children, as Paul tells us in Romans 8, then we are also “heirs of God.” We are adopted members of the GOD family, and we have the same Holy Spirit the disciples received to live out our call to serve, to preach, to heal, and to baptize.

God the Holy Spirit is our Advocate, our defense attorney, pleading our cause and teaching us everything we need to know to live the life of Christ today. Christ's peace is in our hearts as it was in the hearts of those disciples, and we are called to share that peace with the world. We continue to be empowered with the gifts of the Holy Spirit to be the body of Christ in our world today. We are anointed by the Spirit “to be prophets to [God's] people, to be apostles to the world, to be confessors of [the] Gospel and of the wonders [God has] done for us.” “Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful, and kindle in us the fire of your love. Send forth your Spirit and we shall be created, and you shall renew the face of the earth.”

Easter 4 C - Apr 21, 2013

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Sr. Shane Phelan, Companion of Mary the Apostle
Easter 4C - Sunday, April 21, 2013

Acts 9:36-43
Revelation 7:9-17
John 10:22-30

Icon of the Good Shepherd.
From the web site of the Oratory of the Good Shepherd.

I don’t know about you, but I need a shepherd this week.

I need someone to tell me that love continues, that life continues.

I’ve been listening to NPR and reading the New York Times. You might have been watching CNN. I’m grateful not to have a TV this week, because I’d be watching and listening to those voices.

I need to hear my shepherd’s voice.

I need to hear Peter tell me to get up and get back to work.

I need to join the throng before the throne, lifting my voice in response.

To do any of that, I have to fight my way through the other voices. You know those fancy noise-canceling earphones? I want those.

I think of being in an airplane. You get earphones, and you can listen to music or movies, but you never really get rid of the sounds around you in the plane. To do that, to really enter the world of the music and the film, you need special earphones.

I want those.

This week has been unusually horrific for those of us who live in normally quiet places, places with housing and food and some sort of safety. But what we are facing with shock is other people’s everyday life. In Iraq, in Afghanistan, in some neighborhoods in Chicago, people are shot or blown up every day. In Greece, where unemployment is running at 27%, many people are too hungry to study or to work. In places where women are expected to stay hidden, many run the risk of rape or attack just to go to school or work. So this week I grieve for Boston and for West, Texas, but I also grieve for all those places where violence and loss and oppression are normal.

I need to hear my shepherd’s voice.

I’ve been reading Charles Taylor’s magnum opus, A Secular Age. He traces how Western Christendom came to the place where atheism seems not only possible, but reasonable. How did we get to a place where so many can’t hear God in their lives, where God became irrelevant? And what does that have to do with the violence around us?

There have been two stock answers to this question. The traditional, fundamentalist answer is that violence is a result of people turning away from God, that bad things happen either because God is angered (in the case of natural disasters and accidents) or because sinful people do sinful things.

The atheist answer is that religion is a cause of intolerance and hatred, that violence flows out of religion.

These two extremes, which seem like opposites, actually share a conception of God. In that conception, God is angry and quick to punish. God is allied with one tribe and rejoices in the destruction of others. People who hear the voice of that God are indeed likely to justify violence, at least when it comes on their behalf.

But the people who reject that God too often miss the shepherd's voice, the loving voice that calls us all. They put on the noise-canceling earphones, but they don't open the channel to the sound of love.

Taylor suggests that in fact the two sides, secularists and fundamentalists, share a drive to purge the world of evil, to erase the messy parts of us. When that drive is at work, we narrow our world into two categories: evildoers and victims. And that feeds our hunger for violence. The riot of violence on our TV and movie screens, in our schools and in our streets, testifies to the real, deep attraction of violence. Our desire to deny that in ourselves ironically plays into the need to purge, and so we become part of the problem.

As long as we need to purge, we will keep killing. Some will kill for safety, some for honor, some for the sheer adrenaline high. Some will kill in a sick version of religious ecstasy, the only form available in a world where sacred mystery is seen as superstition.

In such a world, we cannot hope to hear our shepherd’s voice.

For Jesus consistently went to people on the wrong side: not only the poor, but to the many who live their lives in a shape greater than evildoer or victim.

He came to Peter, who was not done with weakness and failure.

Through Peter, and through a chain of others, he came to Dorcas.

He came to the throng before the throne, who in their lives heard that voice and answered.

Jesus knew that violence lives in us. He did not seek to purge it. He transformed it. By undergoing violence, he transformed the violence. He overcame the fear of violence not by controlling it for his own ends, but by overcoming fear and offering himself. He faced into the violence with love, and in so doing he changed everything. The shepherd laid down his life for the sheep, and opened the gate to life.

The noise of the world tells us that our safety lies in revenge and extermination. It tells us that we need bigger gates and walls. It drowns out the voices of need, and silences the voice of hope and mercy.

The louder that noise gets, the more we need to listen for the shepherd. We need quiet time, prayer time, time with friends and family. We need to seek out the voices of forgiveness and reconciliation. And we need to add our voices to the choir of worship and praise.

What we do here, in this monastery and in this extended community, is life saving work. Helping people hear the shepherds voice is not just nice. It is part of repairing the world. In a world of meaninglessness and rage, the shepherd calls us to transforming love.

The only sound louder than violence is love.

We don't really need the noise-canceling earphones, as attractive as they can be. We need the ones that let us hear the cries of need, let us hear the chaos of the world, but still send us the sweet sound of our shepherd's voice.

We need the sound of love.

Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor 
and power and might
be to our God forever and ever!
Amen.

Easter 3 C - Apr 14, 2013

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Adam D. McCoy, OHC
Easter 3C - Sunday, April 14, 2013

Acts 9:1-20
Revelation 5:11-14
John 21: 1-19

I love this morning’s gospel.     There is something cinematic about this story.  It’s like a guy film.  Seven guys who don’t seem to know what they’re doing decide like guys do to go fishing – the big guy makes up his mind and the other guys follow along.  Then, as is so often the case when a group of guys just sort of decides to do something, nothing happens.  Hurry up and wait.  Except that some man on the shore calls out to them – Hey, guys – Catch anything?  No?  So lower your nets on the right side.  Suddenly so many fish they can’t manage.  But who is that man on the beach?  The leader of the guys is not the brightest bulb in the sign – it is John who recognizes Jesus, but it is Peter who acts.  He puts on his clothes, jumps in the water, swims to shore, and hauls in the net. 

We know, but the guys don’t, that the man on the beach is Jesus, and he is the reason the guys have been drifting.  Condemned, killed and resurrected – two appearances already! – and the guys still don’t get it.  They’re like lost boys.  So Jesus helps them focus.  He serves them breakfast, and then has a purposeful chat.  Simon son of John, do you love me?  I do Lord.  You know I do.  Feed my lambs.  Tend my sheep.  Feed my sheep.  Jesus gives Peter his new job description.  But this time, no glory.  No young hero stuff.  This time the call is to get old and feeble and then get killed.  Jesus seems to ask, Are you up to it?  Then follow me.

This story is a call story.  But it is so unlike the call story at the beginning of the Gospel.  The first call is about excitement, about following an unexpected and emergent leader, about the prospect of initiating change and doing something new.  But the call story at the end of John’s gospel - for our gospel today is from the very last chapter of John - this call story is about something altogether different.  These guys seem not to be at the beginning of something filled with hope and expectation, but are like lost lads, drifting, unsuccessful, at the end of something but even what they are at the end of isn’t really clear to them.  This is the third resurrection appearance, apparently – the third one! – and they still don’t quite get it.  It bears repeating.  So Jesus hammers it in.

The narrative line of this story is like a template for what is to follow:  If you depend on your own efforts, if you rely on yourself, you will fail.  No self-gotten glory, no fish for self-starters here.  In order to make the catch you need to rely on the one who calls you, whom you don’t always recognize at first.  This call will penetrate to the center of your soul, and will hurt you because it won’t accept your first or even your second answers, but keeps on until you cry out in frustration and anguish, until you declare your love from the depth of your heart.  This call is for the long haul, fishing all night and catching nothing not just once but your whole life.  And the big catch is none of your own doing.  You haul in the big catch because of advice from somewhere, someone you don’t even know.  And you don’t really know who it is until you sit down and share with him, with a stranger, who turns out not to be a stranger at all.  This story tells us that we will find the Lord at the most unexpected times and in the most unexpected ways.

As did Saul of Tarsus.  History’s most famous convert.  For once we are not entirely at the mercy of a thirty or forty year communal memory, a story told and retold and sharpened in the retelling and finally written down, the story we heard from Acts.  Paul himself tells us what happened to him, in his own words, in the beginning of Galatians (1:11-24):            

“For I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that the gospel that was proclaimed by me is not of human origin; for I did not receive it from a human source, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ.  You have heard, no doubt, of my earlier life in Judaism. I was violently persecuting the church of God and was trying to destroy it.  I advanced in Judaism beyond many among my people of the same age, for I was far more zealous for the traditions of my ancestors.  But when God, who had set me apart before I was born and called me through his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me, so that I might proclaim him among the Gentiles, I did not confer with any human being, nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were already apostles before me, but I went away at once into Arabia, and afterwards I returned to Damascus.  Then after three years I did go up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and stayed with him for fifteen days; but I did not see any other apostle except James the Lord’s brother.  In what I am writing to you, before God, I do not lie!  Then I went into the regions of Syria and Cilicia, and I was still unknown by sight to the churches of Judea that are in Christ; they only heard it said, ‘The one who formerly was persecuting us is now proclaiming the faith he once tried to destroy.’  And they glorified God because of me.”      

While Acts doesn’t contradict what Paul himself tells us, Acts tells a very different story, full of action and interesting detail, a little like the story we heard from John this morning.  It is cinematic, strongly plotted, breathless even.  Who doesn’t get caught up in it when they hear it?  Who doesn’t put himself or herself into it, wishing perhaps to be chosen and transformed and given a world-changing task like Saul was?

But Paul’s own account is different.  There is no light, no voice.  There is something reticent, almost passive in Paul’s own account.  The whole exciting narrative in Acts is summed up in a single phrase:  When God was “pleased to reveal his Son to me”.  No dramatic story, no Ananias sent to the street called Straight, no nursing back to health, no scales falling from the eyes.  What Paul gives us instead is entries from his appointments calendar.  Arabia, Damascus, Jerusalem, Syria, Cilicia.  Years pass.  Not much happens for three years, and then he gets two weeks with Peter and James.  This doesn’t sound dramatic.  This isn’t cinematic.  Something happened.  Then I went here, and then I went there, and then I met with people, and then I went out on the road again.  It’s like listening to a friend we haven't seen for a long time tell us about what’s happened in his life, but it’s not an exciting story, it’s really just a list, and our attention maybe drifts just a little bit as we smile back as he drones on and on. 

This sounds like real life. 

These stories seem to say that the call itself is dramatic enough.  Sometimes the haul is so big we can hardly manage what the Lord has given us.  We meet the Lord in a stranger, we have an apocalyptic experience.  But then it is back on the road, for years and years of slogging, till all of a sudden we’re old.  We used to be able to spring up and get right to it, but now we’ve gone all creaky, and maybe the end is in sight.  Paul didn’t begin his writing career till twenty or more years after the Lord revealed himself to him.  Peter didn’t get the job description till he was broken down by the Lord’s persistent asking him the question Peter thought he had already answered. 

Easter Day may be all joy.  But the resurrection life is a long slog.  Simon, son of John, do you love me?  Lord, you know I do.  Feed my sheep.  Not once, not twice, but three times.  Over and over.  Once again, from the top. 

Are we up to it?  If you are, he says, Follow me.